Comment by card_zero
6 months ago
Earlier, even. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_coffeehouses_in_the_17...
The first coffeehouses established in Oxford were known as penny universities, as they offered an alternative form of learning to structural academic learning, while still being frequented by the English virtuosi who actively pursued advances in human knowledge. The coffeehouses would charge a penny admission, which would include access to newspapers and conversation.
That's in the 1650s. Then 60 years later in London the coffeehouses were involved in the rise of printed daily newspapers, they distributed them. (Several of these had advertiser in the name, and were more ads than news, because access to adverts in the early days was desirable and worth paying for.)
That's very interesting! A modern equivalent could be the internet cafés, which of course were never social in the same sense, but charged by the hour.
I feel like I'm slighting the Dutch, who to be fair were also a little bit involved in early coffee culture, but they don't seem to get an article on en wiki.
Internet cafes were social once! I remember making an exciting group excursion to one to participate in some kind of debate over IRC. Pffft.